A Reading of an Extract From ‘Idylls of the King’ by Tennyson

How many of us long for an epiphany—some flash of insight to redeem the dull succession of identical hours. Time passes and nothing happens. No inspiration strikes, no light falls. And yet we still like to believe there could be, at any moment, some sign or wonder that could make all the difference between existing and truly living. In the meantime, we flicker between thought and action, hope and boredom, dream and reality.

“I am half-sick of shadows,” said the Lady of Shalott painting by John William Waterhouse, 1915, oil on canvas. artrenewal.org

The Holy Grail

And all at once, as there we sat, we heard A cracking and a riving of the roofs, And rending, and a blast, and overhead Thunder, and in the thunder was a cry. And in the blast there smote along the hall A beam of light seven times more clear than day: And down the long beam stole the Holy Grail All over covered with a luminous cloud, And none might see who bare it, and it past. But every knight beheld his fellow’s face As in a glory, and all the knights arose…